Product Description

From the worldwide phenomenon The Da Vinci Code to the national best-seller Misquoting Jesus, popular culture is being bombarded with radical skepticism about the uniqueness of Christ and the reliability of the New Testament. Reinventing Jesus cuts through the rhetoric of extreme doubt to reveal the profound credibility of historic Christianity. Meticulously researched yet eminently readable, this book invites a wide audience to take a firsthand look at the primary evidence for Christianity's origins. Reinventing Jesus shows believers that it's okay to think hard about Christianity, and shows hard thinkers that it's okay to believe.

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Trustworthiness at Work        Rating:

This book was a gift from my son. It is an excellent book written in a very readable style. My only negative critique is the subtitle connection to the DaVinci Code. While the DaVinci Code was addressed, I felt that most of the book focused on other anti-Christian books, Christian books on the far left and the Jesus Seminar. I suppose it was a marketing ruse and it really doesn't matter except it irks me a bit when I see this.

This book is a carefully laid-out discussion on the trustworthiness of Scripture. It covers such issues as:

* Oral tradition
* Criteria of authenticity
* Issues tied to textual criticism
* The canon
* Issues tied to myth
* The early texts on Jesus' deity

Prior to this book, I had read several works by Erhman including Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (And Why We Don't Know About Them) and Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why (Plus) (I enjoyed the reading if not the conclusion) . I have also read the works by Baigent and the spate of atheist authors such as Dawkins, Hitchens and Shermer. Reinventing Jesus does a fair job of putting all of these in their place. That is, offering evidence that the Bible can be trusted and evidence that would make most intelligent atheists think about their stance. However, I am sure this will not happen.

It is definitely a book for the average person to learn why we can have confidence in the New Testament today. Using logic and interpretative tools it addresses each topic without ridiculing those that take a different view. In this age of "snippy remarks", outrage and poor manners, I really appreciate this approach.

I recommend this book without reservation.

Michael L. Gooch
Author of Wingtips with Spurs

Top draw well written book        Rating:

This book is not to be missed and please read it, a brilliant read to bring the Jesus of scripture to life and show that he is god in the flesh and can be found, to be historical
could not put it down a treasure to have

yours in jesus

Excellent textual critique        Rating:

Reinventing Jesus is a an excellent exegesis of the Orthodox New Testament texts vis-a-vie the Gnostic texts using internal and extra-Biblical evidence. I had been exposed to some of the concepts of this type of study when I took a course on ancient Israel in graduate school, and found its extension to this topic of great interest.

I have to admit that after reading the very well balanced account of the two sets of texts, that they are very different from one another, and that the survivor simply met the needs of the people of the time more fully. I'm not certain that this has to do with their being "closer" to the teachings of Jesus, however, as almost everyone who witnessed the events of this time probably had his or her own take on the situation. I suspect the entire 1st Century was spent deciding just what the message actually was, and ultimately it came down to two almost opposite concepts. The Gnostic notions of Christianity are much more esoteric, exclusive, and intellectual and focus on perfecting "the self," while those of orthodoxy are more directive, inclusive, require belief more than introspection and focus on others.

I'm not certain however, that I agree with the authors when they insist that the Gnostic texts were later. While I agree that an argument from absence is not a strong one, I also believe that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The secrecy of the Gnostic teachings would almost guarantee that they would not be committed to writing as early as the more open and inclusive teachings of what became orthodoxy. I'm more surprised that they were put on paper at all. This tendency to secrecy and elitism is probably why they did not survive as doctrines into modern times.

I also agree that, far from dictating the content of the new imperial religion or suppressing alternatives, Constantine's primary motive was consensus, order and peace in the kingdom--this one, not the next one. He was nothing if not a pragmatist. That he remained a pagan himself until converting on his deathbed suggests that he had very little religious stock in the outcome of the council of Nicea at that time.

A superb discussion of the topic.

Excellent introduction to issues within NT scholarship.        Rating:

Reinventing Jesus contains a well thought out and scholarly introduction to a number of issues currently being discussed within New Testament scholarly circles, and I'd wholeheartedly recommend it to the layman in high school, college or the workforce, and also to the scholar. This book also served as a great primer for me into the work of Wallace and Sawyer, and Komoszewski's book on the deity of Christ co-authored with Robert Bowman is on its way to me now!

The book covers a large range of topics including oral tradition, textual criticism, early church history, Christology, and the newly internet-revived pagan copycat thesis. Komoszewski et al address (but also in some cases, build upon) the arguments of both popular and academic writers, providing a fair yet critical evaluation of the claims of authors such as Bart Ehrman, Acharya S, Robert M. Price, and Freke and Gandy. They also provide a list of books for further reading in each topic they write about, giving the reader an opportunity to move on once passing the popular introduction to these issues to more academic sources.

All in all, great book, and I would be pleased to see this cohort assemble again for another quality work.

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